Lotties Way, fundraisers remember Charlotte Hope, killed by a drug driver in Shropshire.

Shropshire Star

Shawbury runners were paying tribute to Charlotte Hope by running there socks off for a charity set up in her memory: Lotties Hope. We chat to Charlotte's dad about the charity and the weak sentance her killer has been given.

Transcript

00:00Neil Hope, hello sir how are you? Very well thank you. And you've got the t-shirt there,

00:06Lottie's Way, Charlotte Hope Foundation, we've just got the guys doing the 5k today.

00:11So this was born out of a, it's a positive thing, Lottie's Way, but it was born out of a tragic

00:17circumstance. Just fill us in a little bit on Lottie's Way and who Charlotte Hope was.

00:21Yes so Charlotte, my daughter, she was 19 years old at university, at Edge Hill University doing

00:29a teaching degree to be a private school teacher. She was a volunteer on my Taking Football to

00:34Africa and Beyond appeal and she'd been to Kenya and volunteered for a month on her own when she

00:40was 16. She was very passionate about it, very passionate about volunteering. She was also a

00:45member of the Shropshire Football Association's Youth Council and did lots of other bits and

00:50pieces. Unfortunately on April the 9th 2022 she was hit by high on cannabis and killed instantly.

01:01Her mum was in the car with her and was very badly injured. So out of the tragedy we decided we needed

01:09to keep a length of money and the eventual part of this is that we raised money originally from

01:16the Freestyle Centre in Gilgill in Kenya where Charlotte volunteered. We decided we could spread

01:21the love if you like to different places so we set up, my son Christopher, Charlotte's half-brother,

01:28set up Lottie's Way, the Charlotte Hope Foundation. Fantastic and it's doing doing good work then?

01:34Yeah absolutely so we've now, well this is the end of the first year, we started in January,

01:40we've raised about £26,000 over the year. We've just allocated £18,000 of that.

01:47We do a bids process in the summer. Lots of places, mostly in Kenya, a few other places

01:53around the world put bids in. The trustees sit down and decide where it's going and we've now

01:58allocated that money and that money is now doing good things in Kenya. So a lot of it is the

02:05slum areas, schools, individuals, people that look after people, but it's basically, the idea is it

02:10promotes education and ensures feeding for the poorer people in Kenya and other countries.

02:18So she was she was on the track to do good, well she was doing good things you know, 16 and doing

02:23that in Kenya. I forget what I was doing at 16, nothing quite as you know, I don't think I'd have

02:27been quite up to that myself. She'd been on a couple of the trips out to Africa with me, I mean

02:32we take a group of people out each year and do distribution where we distribute the kits.

02:37So she'd done a few of those, so she you know, she held down football to Africa all the time, so

02:42her intent was that she was going to get a degree, do a probationary teaching years in the UK and

02:47then go and teach in Kenya. Oh wow, okay. Well you know, I mean your life changes after something

02:52like that, you have to gradually try and find a path to you know, continuing. What doesn't help

02:58I suspect is when the person that's been convicted, you suddenly find their sentence

03:04that the judge initially says doesn't account for too much. Just fill us in on your thoughts

03:08on the sentencing and what's happened there Neil, if you're happy to. Well I mean to be honest,

03:13sentencing is a bit of a joke. If you take cannabis and drive at ridiculous speeds,

03:20you know overtaking on bends and everything like that and then kill somebody, I just don't see the

03:24difference between getting into that car and that car becomes the deadly object, you know,

03:29and I don't see any difference between that and carrying a knife to be honest,

03:32but the law sees it as it's not, it's death by dangerous driving. It started as a 10-year

03:39sentence then just got peeled away and peeled away, so he ended up effectively inside for three

03:44years and two months. He then went to an open prison after barely a year and he's now pretty

03:50much out on, you know, day release. He got to spend Christmas with his family, we think,

03:55so we're told. We didn't have a Christmas, you know, it's harrowing to be honest because

04:02you know we've lost Charlotte, we think about Charlotte every day, you know, my wife that was

04:08her only child and they were so close, it's just horrible. And you know an open prison for people

04:14that don't know, it's not a prison with a bigger courtyard, it's, I mean, they're basically

04:19they're out aren't they? They have to be at home. It's a category D prison, it's classed as,

04:26and the reason it's called open is because after a couple of months they get taken out with a

04:31prison guard and they can go shopping and that sort of stuff and eventually they can go out and

04:35get little jobs and they only have to be in really in the evenings, through the night basically,

04:42and after a while they also get weekend release. Yeah, crazy, crazy. We've also been told that

04:48the chances are, because of the new sentencing guidelines, they'll probably be in prison until

04:54February 2026. We've been told they'll probably be released in September, October or November this

04:59year, 2025. I guess, is the way you try and move forward then just to think, well, life's precious,

05:06you know that only too well, let's make the most of ours and if Charlotte's looking down,

05:10let's make her proud, is that how it works? Yeah, I mean, what I would say to people is that

05:15you don't know what you've got until it's gone. You don't expect your children to be

05:20to be gone at 19 years old. You expect, you know, all of our plans for the future

05:25were pretty much based around, you know, my boys and Charlotte and our grandchildren and,

05:30you know, especially with Charlotte, I knew that wherever Charlotte went is where Helen and I would

05:35end up and you lose that straight away and all I would say is, you know, just take time to hold

05:41your children tight really because, you know, give them some time but also you don't know what's

05:47coming tomorrow so enjoy today. Yeah, so if people want to find out a bit more about Charlotte and

05:53the Lottie's Way Foundation, just put it into Google. Type into Google Lottie's Way, it will

05:59come up. If you want to do any fundraising, I mean, these guys have been doing this 5k a day since

06:04December 23. Yeah. Jamie's on his third month of it. Wow. Helen and I did a month of it, you know, so

06:11and it's been incredible. They've, on this alone, they've raised over £4,000.

06:15Amazing. Not just the shortbreed joggers here but people around the country. My brother and his

06:20son and his son's wife are doing the 5k as we speak across in Leicester. Yeah. Yeah, they've

06:27been doing it even more in Oman in the Middle East. Wow, that's crazy. I don't fancy running in those

06:31temperatures. No, not at all. Well, thank you and all the best, you know, with yourself and family and

06:39good luck moving forward with Lottie's Way. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much. So, Jamie, you're about

06:43to do a 5k. Good conditions today? Yeah, it's not too bad. It's quite nice to be fair. It's a little

06:49bit windy so it'll cool us down. And how is your running? It's going okay, it's going okay. It's

06:55quite a lot to do to be fair but it's all worth it. So, you're running for Lottie's Way. How did you

07:01get involved and kind of what caught your attention?

07:16Yeah, nice way to pay tribute to and kind of keep those memories alive.

07:20Was she a good character? Amazing, amazing.

07:32Well, you've got a bit of a gang here with you today, haven't you? Is it the Shawbury? Shawbury

07:36Joggers, yeah. Quite a few of the Shawbury Joggers have done 5k's during the year and the support

07:41has been absolutely fantastic from them. Gary who runs Shawbury Joggers and Lou, they're just

07:46amazing people. Awesome work. Well, we'll let you get warmed up and get cracking in a bit then.

07:51Cheers, buddy. Thank you.

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